Room temperature growth of indium tin oxide thin ®lms by ultraviolet-assisted pulsed laser deposition

Thin indium tin oxide (ITO) ®lms were grown at room temperature on (1 0 0) Si and Corning glass by an in situ ultravioletassisted pulsed laser deposition (UVPLD) technique. The oxygen pressure during the growth markedly in¯uenced the properties of the ®lms. For oxygen pressure below 1 mTorr, ®lms exhibited very low optical transmittance and high resistivity. The resistivity decreased when using higher oxygen pressures while the optical transmittance increased. For a target±substrate distance of 10.5 cm, the optimum oxygen pressure was found to be around 10 mTorr. For higher oxygen pressures, the optical transmittance was higher but a rapid increase of the electrical resistivity was noticed. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy showed that ITO ®lms grown at 10 mTorr were fully oxidized. All grown ®lms were amorphous regardless of the oxygen pressure used. # 2000 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.